Sunday, September 25, 2011

DeBacker's Personal Learning Network

the Rocket City PLN
    Debbie Miser – Huntsville City Schools (HCS) staff development coordinator
    Leslie Graham - Mentor; Mt. Gap Middle School (MGMS) eighth grade English teacher
    Carol Spring – MGMS technology technician
    Kristen Robinson – MGMS sixth grade math teacher
    Virginia Taylor-Mounts – Grand Canyon University peer
the Experts
Angela Maiers- author of Passion Driven Classroom and Class Habitudes; twitter; Angela Maiers.com
Marc Prensky- “Visionary. Inventor. Author. Speaker. Consultant.Futurist. Learning designer. Game designer” (marcprensky.com, 2011); author of Digital Game-based Learning, Don’t Bother me mom , I’m Learning, Teaching Digital Natives: Partnering for Real Learning; Current; Marc’s blog; Marc Prensky.com
Howard Gardner- Professor of Cognition and Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education; author of Truth, Beauty and Goodness Redefined; Five Minds for the Future; editor of Good work: theory and practice; Howard Gardner.com
Marilyn Katzenmeyer- Co-author of Awakening he Sleeping Giant: Helping Teachers Develop as Leaders (3rd edition). She is the president of Professional Development Center, Inc.  
the Resources
Promethean Planet.comCreated by teachers, for teachers, Promethean Planet is a unique teaching, sharing and support community—your places to connect, create, and change the classroom!” (prometheanplanet.com, 2011). I also take online classes on the use of ActivInspire software and hardware via Promethean Planet.
PD360.com “This is the world’s first and largest online, on-demand professional development platform for educators” (pd360.com, 2011).
ISTE.org International Society of Technology for Education) “ISTE advances excellence in learning and teaching through innovative and effective uses of technology” (ISTE.com, 2011). Journals that I subscribe to via ISTE include: Journal of Research on Technology in Education and Journal of Digital Learning in Teacher Education.
Educational Origami wikispaces.comEducational Origami is a blog and a wiki, about 21st Century Teaching and Learning. This wiki is not just about the integration of technology into the classroom, though this is certainly a critical area, it is about shifting our educational paradigm. The world is not as simple as saying teachers are digital immigrants and students digital natives. In fact, we know that exposure to technology changes the brains of those exposed to it. The longer and stronger the exposure and the more intense the emotions the use of the technology or its content evokes, the more profound the change. This technology is increasingly ubiquitous. We have to change how we teach, how we assess, what we teach, when we teach it, where we are teaching it, and with what” (edorigami.wikispaces.com, 2011).
National Council of Teachers of Mathematics.org- “The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics is a public voice of mathematics education supporting teachers to ensure equitable mathematics learning of the highest quality for all students through vision, leadership, professional development and research” (nctm.org, 2011).
An Apple 4 you resources.com- A website put together by Andrew Bonaparte. The site provides free resources for the 21st century teacher. It includes ActivInspire math flipcharts!


I plan on continuing to learn about how students learn and how technology can tap into the various learning styles for the benefit of creating a student centered learning environment. I am also very interested in learning more about graphic and instructional design principles and apply that knowledge to content development. Thirdly, I am continuing to learn more about content development with the use of ActivInspire software. In fact, I have just enrolled in a Promethean Planet class on the use of ActivExpressions. I plan on attending a curriculum development class this summer hosted by Promethean in Atlanta, Ga.
In short I am interested in the following:
ü  Cognitive development
ü  Content development
ü  Use of ActivInspire software

Friday, September 23, 2011

Math Textbooks and the needs of our students

Dan Meyer speaks on math textbooks and how they do not provide students with the opportunity to really solve problems. The textbooks provide students with all the data and graphics needed to just plug in information and solve. Let's learn how to allow the students to have 'conversations' about the problem-- let them ask the questions and put the data together ---- after all when in the real world the problem is not set up for us with all the necessary data, formulas, and 'how to's".--- we have to figure that out. "Math serves the conversation, the conversation does not serve the math!" Watch the video -- makes a world of sense! Thank Dan. (Meyer, D.)  Our school district will be adopting new textbooks this year -- it has been 8 years since we have even looked at new textbooks (math). I am looking forward to see if the books are meeting  the needs of metacognition in the 21st century classroom--????
Video: Dan Meyer: Math class need a make over
Retrieved September 23, 2011 from TED ideas worth spreading

Sunday, September 11, 2011

What are our students learning?

Great video by Alan November, retrieved September 11, 2011 from The Educators PLN.
Are our student's work and learning purposeful? meaningful? project based? Are the projects purpose driven? Are the students creating a legacy? Must see video! Just a reminder of how our students need to learn in the 21st century.

Common Core Standard and Assessments

Insteresting article  on common core standards and assessments. I do think that the idea of  national common standards is a great idea. I  am just not sure that the theory will pan out in reality. Why? Because of the diversity of schools, teachers, and use of technology. Assessibility of good schools and teachers is not equal accross the nation. Article